Handprints?!
Tang Ning, still groggy from sleep, suddenly sat up and stared wide-eyed at his pillow.
Indeed, there were wet handprints on it, and not just one.
Two damp handprints were on either side of the pillow, larger than Tang Ning's own hands, suggesting they couldn't have been made by him.
His heart pounding fiercely, Tang Ning threw back the covers, only to find not just handprints on the bed, but also the same human-shaped imprint he had seen on the ceiling last night!
Overwhelmed by intense fear, Tang Ning nearly collapsed onto the bed, his feeble limbs landing on the quilt that bore the remnants of the human shape. The faint dampness, through the quilt touching his skin, gave Tang Ning the terrifying illusion of coming into contact with that non-existent being.
Ridiculousness, fear, and shame simultaneously stimulated Tang Ning's taut nerves. Dizzy, he attempted to climb out of bed, but his legs got caught in the covers. With weak arms and legs, Tang Ning rolled off the bed, the pain almost making him cry out. Unsure if his "character setting" allowed him to moan in pain, he could only cover his mouth with his hand.
The quilt, hooked by his toes, slid off the bed and fell onto Tang Ning, a bizarre, damp scent assaulting his face – the same scent Tang Ning had smelled in the bathroom last night. Shi Lin had said it was the smell of the river, but Tang Ning could only detect a faint fragrance.
He was actually bewitched by the scent of a bath gel!
Tang Ning clamped his mouth shut, fearing he couldn't help but make a sound. The damp quilt covering him, the lingering strange scent seemed to turn into an undercurrent, threatening to engulf Tang Ning like water seeping through every crevice!
It was that monster!
The monster he had encountered last night! He had unknowingly shared his bed with it for the entire night!!!
Every cell in Tang Ning's body screamed. He threw off the damp quilt, struggled to get up from the floor, hastily put on shoes, grabbed his phone, and stumbled outside.
In the morning courtyard, a hunched figure sat, hands in leather gloves grasping a fish tail, the sharp knife effortlessly slicing below the tail fin, then cutting off the dorsal and anal fins...
"Bang!"
The bloody fish knife fell on the fish head, hand and knife moving in unison, easily chopping off the head. Dark red blood splattered everywhere. After chopping the fish head into four pieces, the old lady quickly scaled the fish, slit its belly, and chopped it into neat pieces of fish meat, a strong fishy smell emanating from the cutting board piled with fish meat.
Blood spattered from her chin to the side of her face, the old lady looked up in silence at Tang Ning, who had just run out of the house.
Tang Ning's breathing halted, a feeling of revulsion he couldn't describe. He covered his mouth, not speaking. The white-haired old lady didn't say a word either. They looked at each other silently, the fish in the bucket struggling as if trying to leap out.
"Up?" The voice of the ferryman broke the silence. He stood straight in the doorway, half his body covered by the shadow of the house behind him, his skinny hand slowly rising to wave Tang Ning over. "Just in time, the fish porridge is ready. Come have breakfast."
Tang Ning took a step back.
"What's the matter?" The ferryman continued to beckon. "Come on, it won't taste good cold."
Tang Ning glanced at the old lady holding the fish knife, hurriedly retreated back to his room, and with a snap, closed the door. The ferryman's voice still came from outside: "Why go back? Come out and eat!"
Tang Ning's hands trembled slightly as he pulled out his phone, a bunch of group messages appeared.
Jiang Mianmian: "Let's share the information we've gathered. I think this town's traditional ceremony..."
The ritual was something Tang Ning had almost figured out yesterday from the old patriarch. He glanced over the group messages, realizing the other players had been up early, probably around five or six o'clock, when the sky was still dim. They were already energetically investigating.
Yi Yao: "Okay, I just found out that yesterday, those NPCs put the two bodies from the river in a small hut, and today those bodies have vanished without a trace."
Chang Hanliang: "Shit, I knew about this too. The NPCs in this town are so useless. I thought having a Taoist priest would keep those ghostly entities at bay, but it didn’t even last a day before they escaped."
Nie Tong: "I heard that a male NPC named Zhang Shunping died last night. He had the habit of soaking his feet before bed, and this morning, he was found by his family with his head submerged in the footbath, drowned alive. Yes, there were also tiny footprints on his neck."
Nie Tong: "It seems this ghost doesn’t discriminate in attacking NPCs and players alike. I'm worried that the dead NPCs might turn into new ghosts."
There were many more messages, but Tang Ning wasn’t just there to read them. He typed hastily: "Help me! There’s something wrong with the family I’m staying with!"
"Knock, knock, knock." A knocking sound came from the window, startling Tang Ning. He stiffly turned his head and saw the ferryman's face outside the window, peering through the glass at Tang Ning as if trying to figure out what he was doing. Then, he slowly walked towards the door.
Tang Ning felt like he couldn’t breathe as he saw the door being opened. The ferryman came in with a steaming bowl of fish porridge, saying, "Have a bite."
Tang Ning backed away. He wasn’t watching where he was going and tripped over a pile of blankets on the floor, falling to the ground. From this angle, the ferryman, backlit, had his face obscured in shadow as he held out the bowl of fish porridge, the rich aroma wafting from it. Tang Ning seemed to flash back to the image of the old lady chopping fish.
"Have a bite," the ferryman said slowly, bending down. His murky eyes, like those of a fish, met Tang Ning’s. His withered, strong hand firmly grasped Tang Ning’s wrist, pulling down the hand covering his mouth.
The other hand brought the bowl of porridge to Tang Ning’s lips, trying to force the hot porridge into him!
No!
Tang Ning leaned his head back, opening his lips, and a song flowed out, smooth and lustrous as white silk, circling the beams, drifting out of the small window, over the roof, and into the courtyard.
The ferryman was momentarily stupefied, frozen in place like a marionette.
From yesterday's attempt, Tang Ning knew he could only sing for about ten seconds, and with not enough energy accumulated today to sing during the day, he had a premonition he could only last ten seconds, not a second to waste.
Tang Ning rolled and crawled away from the ferryman, singing as he made for the door, and encountered a bloody fish knife.
Tang Ning’s mind went blank, nearly forgetting to continue singing.
The old lady wasn’t at the door for long; she too was absorbed in the song, just like the ferryman.
Tang Ning hurriedly bypassed the old lady, racing against time towards the house where Shi Lin was staying! Seven seconds left! Those seven seconds were enough to get him out of the yard, but with no word from Shi Lin yet, he had to check on him!
Six.
Tang Ning reached Shi Lin’s window next door, looked inside, and saw Shi Lin lying on the bed with a talisman on his forehead. At the bed’s head, a green-skinned child squatted beside him, looking down, drops of water falling from the child's hair, dripping onto Shi Lin’s face.
Five.
At that moment, both the little monster and Shi Lin were utterly entranced. Shi Lin was so captivated that he forgot to maintain any expression. If the song were to stop, the little monster would react before Shi Lin did, and Shi Lin's cover would be blown!
Four.
Tang Ning was nearing panic. The duration of the song was insufficient. Three seconds were only enough for him to rush into Shi Lin's room but not enough to take Shi Lin and escape. Once time was up, both he and Shi Lin would be dead!
Three.
Tang Ning ran towards Zhang Yun's house, reasoning that since Zhang Yun had managed to save him from the monster in the river once and had made the bathroom monster retreat another time, he should be able to scare off these monsters a third time!
Two.
He desperately knocked on Zhang Yun's door, but there was no response from inside. Tang Ning suddenly faintly remembered that while skimming through the group messages, there seemed to be a message about Zhang Yun having gone to see the town mayor for some matter.
One.
The song abruptly ended, and Tang Ning turned around dazedly, everything seeming to play in slow motion. He saw the knife-wielding grandmother turn woodenly, a withered hand reaching out from the doorframe, the ferryman sticking out his head, and the ghostly child at Shi Lin's bedside turning its head to lock eyes with the wide-eyed Shi Lin.
It was he who ruined everything.
It was his indecisiveness. The moment he saw the ferryman, he should have immediately started singing. Ten seconds would have been enough to reach Shi Lin's room and drag Shi Lin out of there.
It was his failure to extract crucial information. If he had paid attention to Zhang Yun's message while quickly scanning the group messages, he wouldn't have wasted those crucial last three seconds. At least he could have escaped by himself, not dooming both Shi Lin and himself.
Why couldn't he have been a bit smarter? If only he had been smarter, he could have made better use of his "cards," saving both Shi Lin and himself, instead of always playing a good hand poorly.
"Was that you singing just now?" A deep, magnetic voice suddenly sounded from outside the courtyard.
At the moment this voice appeared, the grandmother and the ferryman froze in place like in a game of "Red Light, Green Light," the ghostly child hid under the bed, and Tang Ning felt an inexplicable familiarity with the voice. He turned around blankly to see a tall figure draped in a bathrobe.
Continuous droplets of water fell from the person's body, seemingly fresh from a bath, with the bathrobe loosely tied, revealing the contour of chiseled muscles beneath, and through the messy curls, a pair of deep, black eyes shone with a predatory and greedy sharpness.
Tang Ning felt almost nailed to the spot by that gaze.
He watched as the stranger took a pair of equally damp glasses from the pocket of his bathrobe. The hand that trembled slightly, as if unable to contain excitement, placed the glasses on a high nose bridge, and then, with long fingers, he brushed back his hair, revealing a handsome and pale face.
The sharp, delicate lips curved upwards, and through the glasses, his gaze seemed to soften. The polite stranger introduced himself: "I am a new guest staying next door, just arrived. I heard your singing while I was bathing, and it was truly wonderful—"
"Sorry to intrude, my name is Shao Yi. May I ask who you are?"